"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." Matthew 22:37

Developing our minds and exploring our universe is a central virtue of the Christian faith. Galileo Galilei, Gregor Mendel, Blaise Pascal, George Washington Carver, Susan B. Anthony, T. S. Eliot, Dorothy Sayers, and Martin Luther King, Jr. are just a few Christians thinkers involved in science, art, and social change. In addition to encouraging our growth in these arenas, we believe that the Christian faith benefits from serious study that helps differentiate faith from superstition.

Jesus gave his life to found a new kind of society based on love and service shaped and informed by God. The Holy Spirit works to establish Jesus' character in our lives. We are called to love others as we would like to be loved, to lead through service, and work to establish God's liberating justice in the world around us. We are to assist Jesus in his work of establishing his kingdom of love in this world by serving those around us. Faith is reflected by an active life of love (John 13:35).

Jesus does not merely give us our marching orders and push us out there to do our best. His life with us and his sacrifice opened the way to give us the gift of his Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit becomes our counselor, teacher, healer, and the one that empowers us to move beyond our personal limitations to reflect the character of Jesus and to literally serve with the power of God. Our faith is more than a philosophy or a set of good ideas. It is an active relationship with God through the gift of his Spirit's presence and power on our lives.